The Honourable Gentleman, Count Binface

Cutting through convention, novelty candidates have been an integral part of the British political system since the 1960s, providing a platform from which complaints about the nation could be voiced and where dissatisfied voters (or those out for amusement) could entrust their contribution to democracy. 

But few in this long and distinguished tradition have reached such a point of significance as Count Binface standing in the by-election in August against Nigel Farage, leader of the far-right Reform UK party. 

 This was clearly an evasion tactic, and indeed, while Farage fights this election, the parliamentary standards committee has no jurisdiction over his personal finances and cannot investigate further. However, other parties who would usually have contested this seat, Labour, Conservatives, Greens, Lib Dems, have refused to put forward candidates, calling the by-election a ‘circus’ and a ‘desperate stunt’, in not standing they refuse to dignify him or his party on the political stage. Left, therefore and even endorsed by these opposing parties, Count Binface now remains as the counterpoint to Farage in this election to the wild adulation of amused onlookers such as ourselves.

Thus Farage, who had predicted an easy win against the ‘establishment’ candidates, now seems trapped between a disillusioned constituency, not particularly supportive of him or of Westminster in general; and a man dressed in a bin and a cape, who if he tried, could hardly seem any less representative of the establishment. In this situation, any result would be a humiliation. Either (most likely) he wins, and has triumphed magnificently over… Count Binface, or he loses, Binface takes his seat in the commons and the entire affair begins to look rather like a political farce extended slightly beyond the limits of reason.

In the humour of this situation lies the value of the joke candidate. Binface will almost certainly lose the election,  but his presence and prominence in the process will serve to diminish his opponents in their pomposity and their arrogance. An example of this is his manifesto, one of which every candidate must propose. While the Labour government (particularly Andy Burnham) has pledged to build 1.5 million homes during their remaining time in office, Count Binface has promised to build just one affordable house. He criticises these established parties for their presumption that they can trick the voting public into voting for them simply because they can politically afford to promise progress before simply abandoning their policies.

What Binface and his fellow novelty contestants (Nick the Incredible Flying Brick, Howling Laud Hope, the list goes on…) bring to the stage of politics is the sense of irreverence that should be shown to all politicians. But more than this, these candidates, and Binface particularly, have the capacity to demonstrate to voters what the conventional media seems increasingly incapable of achieving, that being that while figures such as Farage may seem invincible, incorrigible, impenetrable, cavorting with crypto-billionaires, Epstein, Trump and Putin, they function in a democracy, and are answerable to the people whom they serve, those, in the case of Farage, being the people of Clacton.  

And if the people of Clacton feel that they are being ill-represented and badly served by a man entirely consumed with his own personal gain, they are presented with a serious retaliatory alternative, one which is truly against the ‘establishment’ politics of today:

vote Binface.